~

Sage

"A detour?" I was confused.

"I have some people I need to see and some things I need to take care of," she stated, and I really didn't have any room to question it. It was a cozy little cabin though.

Kir knocked, and a middle-aged woman with 3 poofy... very... fluffy tails appeared, who was happy to greet my mentor with hugs and cheek kisses. I was briefly introduced, but was completely and totally mesmerized by the handful of people in the house that had so... many... fricking... FLUFFY TAILS.

I had to keep myself restrained, but Kir took one look at me and knew what was up when I was sitting on the couch and trying to look away and keep myself lost in my thoughts before I did something stupid.

"What's got you all perked up?" She teased. I guess my ears and my tail gave me away. Darn it. I have to remember that I have those. What the don't tell you about being a "cute little cat girl" is these stupid things give everything away and they have a mind of their own! They're not controllable!

I was freaking out over the fluffy, lovable, adorable people here, including what seemed to be some visitors who had a young child, maybe 5 or 6. I wasn't gonna be able to contain myself.

Kir called the woman who opened the door for us "Lady Magyara," and judging by the tone of the people around her, she was the lady of the house. This lady was given a gift by Kir, one from June (that I didn't know she had). Turns out the two of them were close?

I don't know. Too much to follow. I'm just along for the ride until I can find out if I'm going to get cured for whatever's wrong with me.

That and I'm on complete hypertense overload with all these fluffy ears and tails around me.

Kir sniffed out what it was that had me tense, and smiled. "I've got your first mission for you. Go to the adventurer's hall just down the road. It's a little tavern. Get some information for us. Find out what's happening with the demons."

Carla came with me, I guess also struggling to keep herself suppressed. That place is a scary trap. I don't know if I can go back inside.

Along the way, we bumped into another one of those foxes, this one looking a bit like an adventurer. He had a woman behind him pestering him about something or other, and she didn't stop even when he did to talk to us.

I nervously asked him for directions, forgetting how to speak the language for a moment.

When we got in there, we were greeted by a kinda homey little tavern, dated, but still well-loved and definitely well-used, and it smelled amazing. Like some kind of herb. The lady at the desk greeted us, and I asked her for some information.

"Can you tell us some information?" I asked, barely squeaking out some Elfish. I guess being on overload like I am right now is making me forget all about a language I'm still not 100% at yet.

She laughed. "I can speak English. What do you need to know?"

The woman was pretty fluent, too. It's weird. Doesn't make sense. But I'm thankful, so I guess I can't complain at all. "I've been travelling for the last few weeks. Can you tell me what you know about the demons? Anything I can do for some quick cash nearby?"

"Ah. You probably haven't heard then," she realized.

Uh oh.

"The Wood Elves east of Donthaar were found to be working with the demons. There's an army encampment near them that plans to attack soon. If you want my honest opinion, everything is gonna hit the fan real soon here."

So that's how things are turning out.

"As for some cash, good luck. It's the middle of winter out here and people are being pretty conservative with their money. Things could be bad enough soon here that you're gonna need every last cent. So save up and learn how to hunt if you don't know how."

"I do. Thanks for the info," I said grimly. I fished out a silver coin from my pocket and slid it across the counter.

"Best of luck," she said as she took the coin slowly and gave me a narrow-eyed stare, eye-balling my scar and appearance.

So the encampment's gonna attack. Knowing how completely unorganized things were back there, I've got a sneaking feeling they're not gonna make it. Their plans are gonna crash and burn and all hell is gonna break loose.

From the politics and national affairs Kir's been trying to educate me on, I can tell you that the other nations are all waiting to see which other one caves and jumps in the fight first, because as soon as one of them does, it's free game. This isn't just gonna be a fight against the demons. It's gonna be an all-out war and other nations are just as much of a target.

But I also can't say it's much of a problem to me. At least not yet. There will come a time when I have to step in and concern myself - where and for whom that happens I'm not yet sure - but until then, I need to see this doctor in Vira to see if I'm even gonna be alive long enough to find out.

~

Sorra

Our travels led us upon what was kind of like a valley in the cave, where we came across a massive, three-headed dog. Looking thing. Sorta kinda. It was a three headed dog, I guess in shape, but it had what must have been hundreds of teeth, a nasty, gnarly snout, and saliva ready at the edges of its lips, seeming to froth out like an uncontrolled, rabid beast of death.

One look at it and I was the most invigorated I'd been since I stumbled on my feelings for Sefal.

"Can we kill it?" I asked, my demon tail literally wagging.

"I think we're going to have to. There's not really anywhere else to go."

Feeling the fire under my feet after so long, I decided now would be the time to put to test all the stuff Sefal's been teaching me.

It noticed us, and being probably 2 or 3 times my size, came barreling our way with some force.

I took out the spear and held it out front, bearing myself for impact.

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"You sure you can take that thing on like that?" Sefal questioned, then began chanting out a long cast for an ice spell.

"I think I can," I doubted, but then saw its size, and had to stop and ask myself if that was really the case. Considering my battle performance as of late...

I was torn between whether or not I'd actually be able to defend myself, and ended up diving at the last second. Sefal didn't react, just blasted a storm of long, very sharp icicles at the beast. Some of them hit and did damage, which got us a soul-chilling roar and a very angry hound from the boiler room of hell.

"Don't just stand there!" She shouted as she drew her knife and ran to back me up as the beast lunged one of its heads to bite me.

I barely dodged, then spun my spear around and slammed it through the head of the one that lunged at me. It screeched in an almost alien way, and kicked me with a surprisingly powerful leg. Enough so that I was sent launching back, slamming not just into the wall, but headfirst.

I stood back up dazed, and my neck was in pretty intense pain.

Either way, it was just Sefal now. The head I stabbed seemed to be out of commission, but I don't think that did anything to set the beast back. Or if it did I couldn't tell, because even Sefal was having a hard time.

She had a knife in one, and with the other, she casted a shadow spell to try and blind it while she could gain some distance, having noticed me now coming back towards her albeit disoriented.

The only thing is she's not really all that good at shadow style magics. Feeling instinctively worried for her, I jumped in and swung with my knife, coming at it with a secondary swing from my tail, but these just sliced its apparently thick skin up a little. That and pissed it off.

"UGH! I knew I shouldn't have tried it," Sefal shouted, probably not able to muster out the spell she was trying for. "Back up!" She shouted.

I did as she said after giving it another swing, which it actually dodged. I could only feel more and more pitiful, and barely missed Sefal diving in with her knife in both hands. It was clear we didn't really have the equipment for this, and the beast was now between me and my spear.

It saw her with her knife coming at it, and swiped a paw with disgusting, jagged claws, which connected with her hip and tore her skin open. She shrieked out, and for the first time in my entire life, I was pissed off for someone else.

And most of all, I was legitimately worried about her. I dove over it, hoping I would be enough to take it down without Sefal's help, since she had stumbled back and by the looks of it probably wouldn't be doing any more fighting.

I lunged for my spear, but was swiped to the ground by the three-headed dog. So I guess it's intelligent. Maybe having three heads does that for you.

One of the heads opened its jaws to clamp down on me, which I quickly dodged, shot up, and drove my knife into its neck. But there was still another head, and that got its jaws sunk deep into my shoulder instead.

My body rocked with the force of my heart thrashing pure rage fuel into my mind, and I lost all feeling everywhere. I had only one instinct: kill. Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill.

KILL!

I didn't even bother with my knife. I went straight for my tail, which at this point in my mind wasn't even my tail. It was just a weapon, which I proceeded to grab, and use to drive in and out and in and out of every single place in this monster that I thought would be even remotely important.

It eventually fell, and at that point, so did I, bleeding from I don't even know how many wounds. It's not like it didn't fight back.

I won. I guess. Yippee.

~

We both had to hobble our way into a small little inlet. I called it a den, since it was a small pebble-shaped hollow. Sefal was hurt pretty bad, mostly from her hip, but she had a few other punctures and bruises.

She says she should be healing but she doesn't have a clue why that isn't the case. I say it's called performance anxiety and it's normal.

In all seriousness, I don't think Sefal was doing well. I saw it as a chance to take care of her, and I may or may not have extensive medical background as Lydia, so I felt I was getting bonus points for knowing what I was doing. Not that there were much of any plants, let alone any that would have healing properties, but I did what I could.

She was mostly lax about it, but that was probably because our situation was grave. We didn't talk much at all, though. I was afraid I'd make it weird if I spoke, so I didn't start conversation and she either didn't want to talk or frankly was too weak to.

At least that was until she was looking like she'd make it just fine, and while I was changing out one of her bandages, I collapsed.

I woke I think minutes later to Sefal straight over top of me, glaring me dead in the eyes as she screamed, "You stupid IDIOT! How dumb can you possibly be??"

To be honest, I was still completely confused for a moment, and all I could think about was how she sounded legitimately worried. It's hard to imagine her feeling that way, but there she was in my grill with the tiniest twinge of fear in her eyes.

"You brainless monkey! I cannot believe you're this stupid."

I sobered up and came to very quickly.

"Alright now listen here. My bad for trying to take care of you. But sorry I saved your life. How could I ever pay you back for taking care of you all this time? Dear me oh my do I sure feel a pang of guilt for keeping you alive."

"Ohoho like you're some hero. Carefully, everyone, he's your saint and savior. Wouldn't want to hurt his ego."

"Uh oh. I think I might have caught the high and mighty fairy almost saying thank you. We might have to start another war. Such an atrocity can't go on in this world."

"Aww puppy," her face contorted in an extreme mockery of cuddliness. "It's okay, mama's here. You've been so brave."

I shot up to get back in her grill for that one. "Alright you lis- haaaaaahahahahaha"

It was then I remembered I had a pretty giant wound in my torso from the three-headed dog. You know, just a gentle reminder. Not like a heart-stopping gunshot shock that feels like death himself spilled his coffee on your shirt.

I had to settle down after that, but since Sefal was getting towards recovering, she flipped roles and started to take care of me. And it was nice. Not that I could tell her. Waking up like that pissed me off and I felt a lot more like myself again.

"Myself" being in some kind of extreme pain and picking a fight with anyone or anything even daring to cross me in the smallest most insignificant way.

In our little makeshift shelter in the den, I couldn't help letting myself slow down and be taken care of. It felt like when my parents made me soup in bed on a sick day, or like Christmas morning breakfast where all you can do is enjoy someone else doing everything for you.

Both of us were good with medicine, and I was smart enough to know I'd die if I didn't rest. When Sefal made me a light dinner, I tried getting away with having her feed it to me, but I think that gave me away a little, because she gave me a strange look and that was the end of that.

But she did give me a washcloth bath, at least the important stinky parts that weren't inappropriate for her to be washing. When she spoke, she really did sound like she was worried about me. I don't think it was because she deeply cared about me or anything drastic like that, but she was still worried. So in some way she did care.

Despite our differences, she was sweet, and me laying here, I had plenty of time to slow down and realize that she was my weak spot. I'd easily throw myself into this situation for her again. Does that change that she's an asshole and I want to kill her every five seconds? Hell no.

But deep down I know she's just trying to find who to trust, which in a way I can relate to.

While she was giving me another quick washcloth bath one time, she said, "You know for someone who prances around all alpha, you certainly don't stink like one."

I gave her a glare, but behind my eyes I really wanted to make some stupid flirtatious comment like, "I'd never dream of being less than tip-top for you," or some stupid hopeless romantic shit like that.

When we both knew I was getting better, I couldn't be babied so much, which kind of sucked, but I was happy to be out and killing my dinners again. While I was out gathering food for our departure soon, I thought about how easy it was to kill these monsters now, but the one thing I can't kill is my fear of telling Sefal how I really feel.

As we left the temporary shelter, making our way along the cave again and passing through breathtaking caverns, bioluminescent plants and roots coated the walls and interlocked with one another, creating this sort of pulsating heartbeat of otherworldly, ethereal blues. It was sort of like the red veins from earlier, but so much prettier.

We'd seen some nice parts of the cave before, but this was so much more. It felt like nobody who's ever lived has seen this, like only we have seen it and we're the only ones who ever will. There were glowing waterfalls and ponds with crystal-blue shining lily pads. When you touched one it made a strange gleaming sound.

You could never find something like this on Earth.

I enjoyed every second of the times we had to bundle up for the cold, and the long hours waiting for her to wake up were a lot easier.

I realized I can't hold my feelings in forever. After this war, I'm gonna tell her. That's a promise to myself.